Red Poppy Wedding Cake

Back in August I started work on a dummy (styrofoam) cake with the intention of building it in layers to practice some new techniques I've been wanting to try. It started out with lots of plain white ruffles:

And then those ruffles got a paint job, making them pop out more against the white cake and look a little bit less like petals and a little bit more like strings or frills.

And now, they've grown into bright and beautiful poppies. Straight outta The Wizard of Oz ya'll.

Styrofoam cake for the win. I loved seeing how many different cakes I could stretch out of one! Poppies are one of my favorite flowers and I did them in a slightly abstract style, purposefully leaving brush strokes for a painted look.

I think I might like it without the leaves even better:

Same design, three really different ways. Which is your favorite?

Red Ruffle Wedding Cake

Recently this white ruffle dummy cake that I made a while ago just started looking so white to me. When I made it originally I contemplated making the flowers different colors but decided the white on white design looked elegant as it was. But enough of that, it's cold outside now and the design needed a splash of warm color. I hand painted the edges red and took pictures in stages to show how the balance of red and white came through. Some of my favorites are from when I was only about halfway through, because the remaining white ruffles really pop. 

I used gel food coloring and a small straight edge paint brush. A design like this would definitely be much cleaner if I had colored the flowers from the get-go isntead and dipped the edges of the ruffles before adhering them to the cake.

The result is a pretty startling difference and completely transformed the feel of the design. It's a perfect example of how you can add color to a traditional wedding cake and end up with a very original - but still elegant - cake design.